My mind is too commonplace for this task. If my attempt to explain sounds crude, please forgive it and supply what is beyond me.
I can only say now that when I once told you Susan could stand alone, I was mistaken. In a sense she can. If her health does not give way, life will never beat her down. But—there are the needs of women, older than art. They tear at us, Mr. Hunt; at least while we are young. I could not say this to you, but I must manage somehow to write it. I do not refer to passion, taken by itself. I am old enough to be shocked, Mr. Hunt, to find that many brilliant women to-day have advanced beyond certain boundaries so long established. You will understand.
A woman's need is greater than passion, greater even than motherhood. It is so hard for me to express it. But she can only find rest when these things are not lived separately; when, with many other elements, they build up a living whole—what we call a home. How badly I put it; for I feel so much more than the conventional sentiments. Will you understand me at all if I say that Susan is homesick—for a home she has never known and may never be privileged to know? With all her insight I think she doesn't realize this yet; but I once suffered acutely in this way, and it perhaps gives me the right to speak. Of course I may be quite wrong. I am more often wrong than right.
I venture to inclose a copy of some lines, rescued last week from our scrap-basket. I'm not a critic, but am I wrong in thinking it would have been a pity to burn them? As they are not in free verse, which I do not appreciate as I should, they affected me very much; and I feel they will tell you, far more than my letter, why I am a little worried about Susan.
Young Mr. Kane informed me, when he was here on Sunday, that you and Professor Farmer are well. He seems a nice boy, though still a little crude perhaps; nothing offensive. I am confined to the room to-day by a slight cold of no consequence; I hope I may not pass it on to Susan. Kindly give my love to Sonia, if you should see her, and to little Ivan. I trust the new housekeeper I obtained for you is reasonably efficient, and that Tumps is not proving too great a burden. I am,
Respectfully yours,
Malvina Goucher.
The inclosed "copy of some lines" affected me quite as much as they had Miss Goucher, and it was inconceivable to me that Susan, having written them, could have tossed them away. As a matter of fact she had not. Like Calais in the queen's heart, they were engraven in her own. They were too deeply hers; she had meant merely to hide them from the world; and it is even now with a curious reluctance that I give them to you here. The lines bore no title, but I have ventured, with Susan's consent, to call them
MENDICANTS
We who are poets beg the gods
Shamelessly for immortal bliss,
While the derisive years with rods
Flay us; nor silvery Artemis
Hearkens, nor Cypris bends, nor she,
The grave Athena with gray eyes.
Were they not heartless would they be
Deaf to the hunger of our cries?
We are the starving ones of clay,
Famished for deathless love, no less.
Oh, but the gods are far and fey,
Shut in their azure palaces!
Oh, but the gods are far and fey,
Blind to the rags of our distress!
We pine on crumbs they flick away;
Brief beauty, and much weariness.
And the night I read these lines a telegram came to me from New York, signed "Lucette Arthur," announcing that Gertrude was suddenly dead. . . .